Abstract This research aims to answer the question if e-commerce favoured in a special way the growth of low-cost carriers within the civil aviation market. After defining low-cost and traditional carriers’ business models, data on transported passengers were collected for three countries (Italy, Germany and Spain) and confronted with the number of e-consumers. Despite a significant correlation in all the three markets, only in Italy our hypothesis has been supported by Granger causality, and the regression analysis allows to forecast a future characterized by a growing dominance of LCCs. Although the definition of an econometric model will require further studies, the distinctive features of the Italian market might represent a starting point for future research on the complex relationship between e-commerce and air transport.

中文翻译：

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电子商务在低成本运营商成功中的作用

摘要 本研究旨在回答电子商务是否以一种特殊的方式促进了民航市场低成本航空公司的发展。在定义低成本和传统运营商的商业模式后，收集了三个国家（意大利、德国和西班牙）的运输乘客数据，并面对电子消费者的数量。尽管所有三个市场都存在显着相关性，但只有在意大利，我们的假设得到了格兰杰因果关系的支持，并且回归分析允许预测以低成本航空公司日益占据主导地位为特征的未来。尽管计量经济学模型的定义需要进一步研究，但意大利市场的独特特征可能代表着未来研究电子商务与航空运输之间复杂关系的起点。